Tag: Key West

Leave Your Boots and Mittens at Home This Holiday Season Dreaming of a bright Christmas? Consider a trip to Key West to get a warm holiday fix. ~Advertisement~ ~Advertisement~ Love the Florida Keys? You might like these posts: Biscayne,…

Touring Graveyards for History and Understanding I suppose if you are bashful, a cemetery is a great place to visit given that no one is likely to talk to you much. I like cemeteries for the opportunities they provide to…

Mid-Mid-August, end-of-summer, work slowdown, mind elsewhere, vacation, a break, who can concentrate? I am here, but my head is at the beach. —Lori Tripoli Planning a beach vacation? Consider these destinations: Gulf Getaway: Oasis in Condo-Land Biscayne, Largo, West My…

The Key West Cemetery is probably the first one I visit recreationally. No relatives of mine are there. I hesitate: Is this okay? Just going in to look? Appreciating the stillness, the spookiness, the peace, the quiet, the flowers? Is…

Add the explosion of the battleship Maine in Havana Harbor in 1898 to the list of historical events I don’t know enough about. I would “remember the Maine” if only I could. I know the incident triggered the Spanish-American War.…

I first meet Gertrude Stein during my Pablo Picasso phase, and my Hemingway phase, and my F. Scott Fitzgerald phase and then I come across her in Bryant Park in New York and I see her resting at Père-Lachaise in…

Note from the Brawny Sherpa: Sometimes, too much tequila can be a good thing. —M. Ciavardini Heading to Key West soon? Consider these: The Duval Crawl Southernmost Shelter Losing My Veganity in Key West

I’m not in Belize for more than a day when I am ready to drop everything and relocate there. I love the jungle, the caves, the thatched roofs, rising waters, wildlife, and the complete lack of people. I also like…

As a vegan, I’ve ordered omelets hold the eggs (because otherwise I tend to get steamed vegetables for breakfast when I actually want fried ones), had many a B.L.T. and asked to hold the bacon and the mayo, and requested…

The Brawny Sherpa and I walk rather randomly through the old streets of Key West, heading south toward the water after cruising the cemetery. We’re expecting something brighter after confronting the damp, overgrown, decay of the graveyard, and we are…

Travel to the American Revolution

I haven’t visited any places specifically to learn about the War of Independence, but I have stumbled upon little reminders at a few places. Seeing little bits of the past brings history alive for me. I know I learned about…

American history keeps coming to me as I travel in the northeastern United States. I realize that, as a political science major, I learned more about the French and the Russian revolutions than the one had here at home. French…

I stand in Mapleshade Cemetery in Ridgefield, Conn. and look at the grave of Corporal William Lee and see that he died in September 1776 while serving during the Revolutionary War. He died at the age of 23 without ever…

A reminder to observe your world, no matter how close to home you are traveling: How many times do I walk into Rosy Tomorrow’s restaurant in Danbury, Conn. without noticing a sign posted outside? I have multiple opportunities to learn…

Before France’s Comte de Rochambeau showed up in Newport, the city was under the control of the British during the American Revolution. Trinity Church, an Anglican congregation, was built in 1726 and “was spared . . . humiliation and ruin”…

Who Is the Bashful Adventurer?

A telemarketer changed my path. My life was humming along. I was a freelance writer and editor, a single mom, a frequent volunteer, and content. Then I decided to give a random telephone surveyor a break. I agreed to answer a few questions on travel destinations and tourist preferences. When I answered never to “how many times have you been to London?,” the telemarketer’s tone shifted quickly. She was talking to an unworldly woman.

She was right. I’d been to Italy, the Caribbean, Mexico, Canada, and plenty of states. I hadn’t trekked through Europe, though, or gone to Asia or visited the Middle East. I was alone, I was a single mom, I was a freelancer. I stopped letting these be excuses and started getting on planes. I became the Bashful Adventurer.

—Lori Tripoli

Around the Planet

Cool in Iceland

The hardest part about traveling to a place none of your friends have been to before is figuring out where to stay. What’s the most desirable part of the city? What provides the best value? How good is the Internet?…

People ask what I did on my short trip to Iceland and, in retrospect, it seems not much. I soaked in geothermal pools, watched a meteor shower in the darkness, saw some of the countryside and a bit of Reykjavik.…

Of all of the options for a day in Reykjavik, the Brawny Sherpa and I choose to learn more about Vikings. We head to the Settlement Exhibition, more formally named the Settlement Exhibition Reykjavik 871 +/-2. It’s a small and…

A bit of snow and a bus getting stuck in a snow bank slow our visit to Iceland’s Geysir, for which all other geysers are named, for about a minute. Icelandic drivers and tour guides know what to do in…

When seeking an unknown-to-us restaurant or coffee bar, the Brawny Sherpa and I have a tradition of choosing the second most viable place. This habit comes from too many experiences pulling off a highway exit, easing into the first option,…

I expect the Northern Lights to highlight my trip to Iceland, but my visit to the Blue Lagoon in Grindavik turns out to be even more heavenly. A geothermal spa, the Blue Lagoon features large pools of 100-degree bluish-white water,…